Pakistan-Israel Relations

The relations between Pakistan and Israel have strange dynamics. There is no direct source of conflict between the two but there are loads of other reasons for which we never diplomatically recognized the State of Israel. Historically, after independence Pakistan and India both had to play the “Israeli Card” to gain the support and sympathies of the Arabs. Pakistan went too far ahead and actively helped the Arab armies against the Israel. Both in Six Days War in 1967 and Yom Kippur War in 1973, Pakistani pilots fought along side the Arabs and shot down around 10 Israeli aircrafts. Israel was never used to such losses in dog fights.

With the passage of time, Arabs realized the reality and went ahead with the normalization of relations with Israel while Pakistan was left on it’s own. Israel, being expert in covert and back channel diplomacy, started establishing contacts with Pakistani diplomats and political leaders. In the last two decades, the contacts have evolved from formal diplomatic niceties or polite conversations into a formal convergence of interests. Pakistan, the only Islamic country with nuclear weapons, is a constant source of concern for Israel. There are numerous occasions on which Israel tried to launch a preemptive strike on Pakistani nuclear installations but odds were not in its favor. Now that things have gone far ahead and it is near to impossible to covertly destroy our nuclear weapons, Israel is pursuing the diplomatic path. Musharraf, who is always in need of international support, emerged as a natural ally to them. In the past one decade of Musharraf government, a lot of formal and informal contacts were established with Israel. The famous hand shake between Musharraf and Ariel Sharon on the side lines of United National General Assembly meeting in September, 2005 was just an open declaration of the new state of affairs. Though Jerusalem Post had reported about that meeting two days in advance and Pakistani officials denied it but later it was proved that JP was right and our foreign ministry spokes person Muhammad Naeem Khan lied to the whole nation. The meeting between Khurshid Kasuri and Silvan Shalom in Istanbul was a formal acceptance of our relations. The subsequent address of Musharraf to American Jewish Council took the relations to a new level. The copy of his address can be found here. On a personal note, it was a very balanced speech and i really appreciated Musharraf for it. Coming back to the topic, American Jewish Council proved it loyalty to the Musharraf government with the visit of Mr Jack Rosen to Pakistan. Mr Rosen visited Pakistan when emergency was imposed and people were too lost in the local politics to notice it except for the usual hue and cry in few of the media sources. The hour long meeting between Musharraf and Ehud Barak in Paris is another step in the same direction. An interesting fact is that the Israelies again expressed their concern about the safety of Pakistan nuclear arsenal and the state of Iran. This is a very clear indication to the extra ordinary interest of Israel in Pakistan.

Historically, Pakistan is constantly trying to keep up pace with the rest of arab islamic countries in the normalization of it’s relations with Israel. The condition for the formal recognition of State of Israel by Pakistan has been attached to the creation of a parallel independent Palestinian state but Pakistan has to cater to the growing strategic relations between it’s rival India and Israel. We should keep in mind the fact that Israel is now one of the major supplier of modern weapons to the Indians. They have also trained their forces to crush the freedom movement of Kashmir. Few years back Pakistan also shot down an Israeli made Indian drone that violated our airspace and was shot down by our forces. It was one of the first incident in which Israeli made systems were used to violate our national sovereignty.

Looking ahead, i see no further progress in Pakistan-Israel relations unless Israel solves the decades old Palestinian issue. This is one of the major hurdle in the normalization of Pakistan-Israel relations. Even if the Palestinian problem is solved, it will still require a bold, courageous and sharp leader to accomplish this task as Israel has become a taboo in Pakistan and associated with the enemies of Islam. I am sure a lot more is associated with Jews then what they are actually capable of; as if they are the only people in the world with the brains and who are hell bent on the destruction of Islam. The change of this thinking is only possible if Israel tries to show sincerity in it’s actions towards Muslim and stop the terror it has un leashed on the Palestinian Muslims.